Iranian film 'smuggled' to Cannes festival

By Gautaman Bhaskaran

CANNES, MAY 13. The passion for cinema is to be seen here to be believed. The Cannes International Film Festival, now into its third day here, has certainly smuggled out one movie from the country where it was made. At least, the Festival has been party to this little game.

Ms. Samira Makhmalbaf, the 20-year-old Iranian woman (her father is the famous auteur, Mr. Mohsen Makhmalbaf), whose Blackboards was screened the other day in the most prestigious Competition section, could never have made it here the straight way. Her work had to be smuggled across the Iranian border.

Mr. Marco Mueller, director of the Locarno Film Festival, who co- produced Blackboards

along with Mohsen, says that he will take the entire blame for bringing it this way. ``Mr. Mohsen and Ms. Samira have not been involved in this. I want them to continue creating cinema in Iran,'' he said.

Blackboards, shot on the mountains without the permission of the Iranian authorities, would probably be shown in that country sooner or later, but for the moment, one could well imagine how angry those concerned with certifying the picture should be.

Obviously, for Blackboards is set in the volatile Kurdistan. The movie talks about a group of teachers wandering with their blackboards, which is used not just to help children learn, but also as a shield against bullets and bombs.

With a cast of non-professional actors (with one exception), Ms. Samira paints a disturbing image of a life where simple people are pushed from one hostile terrain to another by ceaseless shelling and firing. Their struggle to survive, their relentless search for food and water form the backdrop of the Iran-Iraq war (on the screen), when the Kurds had a miserable time fleeing from the chemical weapons used by the Tehran regime.

Although the film may not be high on craft, may be a little slow for the modern viewer, Blackboards captures the essence of a certain brutality, even as it strives to make a profound statement.

Ms. Samira, who fortunately represents the section of Iranian women that is active in the social and political fields, feels that things are changing in her country. Even though, the young do not have much time to pursue education, because their parents did not provide for them, boys and girls have a certain nationalistic fervour in them, a certain spirit that help them to tide over obstacles.

Another interesting piece of celluloid, screened at Cannes the other evening, is Mr. Ken Loach's Bread and Roses. It is a poignant story of immigrant janitors in Los Angeles who fight not just for bread but for roses too.

Mr. Loach, who has consistently made thought-provoking cinema, focuses here in Bread and Roses on two Mexican sisters and their trials in the hands of master bosses who ruthlessly control the janitors. Although it takes a young American lawyer to goad the two women and the rest into even thinking about justice, it is ultimately Maya's (the younger sister) pluck and courage that wins her people perks like medical insurance and leave benefits, roses in other words. Mr. Loach, who has always projected the underdog in his movies (My Name is Joe, Raining Stones andLadybird, Ladybird), takes up in his latest effort the cause of those hundreds who keep America's high-rises spotlessly clean. There is a certain personal touch in the narrative, and this is precisely what endears this picture to one's heart.

For Mr. Loach, this may not be his most intimate film (Ladybird, Ladybird was), but critics at Cannes seem to think otherwise. Well, what about the jury ? Will it give roses to Bread and Roses?

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : Entertainment
Previous : In pursuit of perfection
Next     : Dance embraces drama